Máirtín Ó Cadhain
The novel in which the dead of a Connemara graveyard gossip and quarrel for three hundred pages was written by a man from this coast. Máirtín Ó Cadhain was born in Cois Fharraige on 4 January 1906, taught school until his IRA membership got him dismissed, recruited Brendan Behan in the 1930s, spent the Emergency interned in the Curragh, and in 1949 published Cré na Cille, the book that brought literary modernism back into Irish after the death of Pearse.
Checked against the source on 2026-09-19.
Máirtín Ó Cadhain on the 3D model; tap a pin for its page and directions.
Republican and writer
Reading An Phoblacht drew him into republicanism; living in Camus in the Gaeltacht with Seosamh Mac Mathúna, he joined the native speakers' land campaign that helped found the Meath Gaeltacht. He served as an IRA recruiting officer and was interned with Behan and hundreds of others. His politics were Marxist and anti-clerical, and his programme, Athghabháil na hÉireann, the re-conquest of Ireland, meant decolonisation and re-Gaelicisation together.
The books
Cré na Cille came in 1949; the story collections include An tSraith ar Lár, An tSraith dhá Tógáil of 1970 and An tSraith Tógtha of 1977, with The Road to Brightcity translated in 1981, and his journalism was gathered in Caiscín, his Irish Times columns of 1953 to 1956, and Ó Cadhain i bhFeasta. He died in Dublin on 18 October 1970 and is buried in Mount Jerome. The university's Gaeltacht centre in Carraroe, Áras Mháirtín Uí Chadhain, carries his name, and the model on this page pins the memorial to him in Spiddal.
Questions people ask
What is Cré na Cille?
Where was Máirtín Ó Cadhain from?
Written from Wikipedia, "Máirtín Ó Cadhain" (CC BY-SA 4.0), read on 2026-09-19, and from the OpenStreetMap places on the model. Nothing has been added from memory; follow the source for its footnotes.